


Tempered in Fire and Water

by sister_coyote



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Missionfic, OrgXIII
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-12
Updated: 2006-09-12
Packaged: 2017-10-03 06:08:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sister_coyote/pseuds/sister_coyote
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Demyx bears up under adversity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tempered in Fire and Water

**Author's Note:**

> Mild spoilers for Kingdom Hearts II of the who-the-characters-and-Org-are variety; no plot spoilers.

It wasn't the heat that got to him but the _dry_. The open deserts of Agrabah drew the water from him as sweat and sucked it away until his lips cracked and his skin stretched tight, and the blowing sand kicked up dust that coated his skin and got in his mouth to turn his spit to clay.

"Xigbar," he said.

Xigbar half-turned to look at him. "Yeah, kid?" The dust in his hair blurred the sharp, definite streaks of silver against black.

"I have dust in my _eyeballs._"

"You'll live," Xigbar said, ever sympathetic.

They trudged on. Demyx didn't talk much, because opening his mouth meant letting the hard-oven blast of hot air into his mouth and down his throat, and every time he did that it felt like a small battle: the moisture of his body versus the whole _world_. Every so often Xigbar stopped and held out his hand, and space and gravity shifted very slightly at the top or bottom of a sand dune, so that a whole layer of sand trickled down, revealing . . . another layer of sand underneath. Then they would study the dune until they were sure that it was just sand, nothing but sand. It was possibly the dullest thing Demyx had ever done.

And it went on for hours and _hours_ under a hard blue sky that offered no rain, nor even the thready lines of vapor that Demyx could gradually turn into rain.

They stopped in the shadow of a red cliff. Demyx ran his fingers over the rock, feeling for any deep-buried current of water that he could coax to the surface. No; dry as the bones of the dead. So he hunkered down in the shadow and cupped his hands, and summoned water from nothing, which was harder. It bubbled up between his fingers and he let it run for a while, cleaning the grime and sweat from his hands and soothing him with its cool liquid touch. Then he drank, and held out his hands to Xigbar, who drank as well, if awkwardly, from the continual clear spill over his fingers. He washed his dusty face, and ran water over his hair (which had sagged with sweat and matted with blown dust and was more a mop of spikes than any definable style) and drank again, and then let the wellspring-from-nowhere run dry. Reluctantly.

"Are you certain the scarab half is here?" he said, his mouth refreshed with water.

"Since when am I sure about anything?" Xigbar's lips pulled into a mirthless smile. "But Vexen is."

And they couldn't just take a portal straight there, because they weren't sure where _precisely_ it was, which meant he was in this trudging dusty _hell_ for as long as that took.

He wondered if Xigbar was being so taciturn for the same reason he was.

How many dunes were there in a desert?

*******

They stopped again, after sunset, in the lee of a great dune. Demyx summoned water with which to wash and drink and wash again; Xigbar made a fire, although he had to use more mundane means.

He sat close to Xigbar, because the night was cold even with the fire. He edged so close their shoulders were brushing, but no closer, because Xigbar was . . . weird, about physical stuff when they were on a mission. Xigbar was cocky and laid-back, but he took his work seriously for reasons Demyx couldn't wholly grasp. Well, truth be told, Demyx didn't push the issue because he knew he needed to stay alert himself or he would get flayed.

A thought flitted around his mind as he watched the flames, something he wasn't sure he wanted to examine too closely.

"They're hoping I fail," he said suddenly, before he lost his nerve.

Xigbar didn't look as surprised by the statement as Demyx had anticipated. "You think?"

Demyx exhaled hard. "I'm not _stupid_. Or unobservant. Agrabah? Me? If there's any world in which I'm less comfortable, less powerful, I haven't found it yet."

Xigbar didn't say anything.

"So I'm guessing someone is setting me up to fall. I—it doesn't make any sense otherwise." He frowned. "Why me? Lexaeus is the obvious choice for something like this. He could shift one of the dunes even faster than you could."

"Right," Xigbar said. "'Cause water in the desert is _totally_ useless."

"I did think of that." Demyx stared into the fire. "But you could easily carry a gallon or two, and open a portal to refill the bottles. So I'm unnecessary, and I'm the one who can least well handle the desert, and I think that can't be a coincidence."

"I think you should get that maybe this isn't about _you_." There's no malice in the words, and Demyx could feel that Xigbar was . . . unusually tense, beside him.

"Maybe," he said. "But I think it is. I really do."

He stared into the fire for a long time, and was surprised, when he finally looked away, to see that Xigbar was staring at him. Xigbar's expression was utterly opaque.

*******

"So. Assuming you've got it figured. You're gonna do what about it, exactly?"

A long silence, filled by the snapping of the fire.

" . . . I'm not going to let them be right."

Another silence, shorter, and then a gunshot-crack of laughter.

"Right on, kid."

*******

It was Demyx who found the scarab, but not until after another long day and a half in the heat and sand.

He wandered the edge of delirium with the longing for water, for wetness, and would summon a little bubble of water in his palms from time to time just to _feel_ it, even though he knew it was a waste of power. It was that or open a portal to somewhere less dry, and this, at lest, didn't count as running away. Not that he had the energy to run anywhere. Putting one foot in front of the other, and breathing the arid wind, was all he could manage.

"When this is all over, I'm going to Atlantica. For, like, a week. A _month_."

"Sure, kid."

"And you're coming with me."

" . . . as _if_. Singing fish? Not my bag."

"Yeah, well, cloudless skies and dead-dry sands aren't mine. As you said to me, you'll live."

"The difference is that this is a mission, not a holiday."

"The _difference_ . . . " Demyx began, and then froze. Something glittered on the side of the nearest dune. Something thin and bronze-shining . . .

"Khunda-be-praised," he breathed.

"What?" Xigbar asked, but Demyx was slipping his way up the dune, carefully, terrified of dislodging the scarab-half and losing it under a flood of sand. He edged his hand toward it, fingertips just brushing the metal, and reeled it into his palm.

"Got it. Xigbar. I _got_ it."

*******

Xigbar opened the portal, and Demyx followed him through, into the cool nothing-dark which didn't steal the moisture from his lips. Demyx kept the scarab-half clenched in his fist, proof of his own ability, proof that he'd _survived_, proof that they couldn't keep him down. He swayed a little on his feet as he dropped it into Xemnas' hands, but didn't miss the very faint smile of satisfaction on the Superior's lips.

As soon as they were out of the Superior's sight, Xigbar caught Demyx by the wrist, swung him around, and kissed him. At first the angle was wrong, and they clicked teeth, but then Xigbar tilted his head and kissed him again, thoroughly. Demyx tasted dust and clay and couldn't bring himself to care, even a little.

"You did good," Xigbar said when they broke for breath. Kissed him again.

"Oh yeah?" Demyx licked his lips.

"I'll give you a hint, though," Xigbar continued, straight into his ear, warm wet breath making Demyx shiver. "Wasn't anybody trying to set you up."

Demyx pulled back a fraction, meeting Xigbar's sharp yellow gaze. " . . . It was a test."

"Yup." Xigbar had the wickedest grin; it could make Demyx feel lustful and terrifed and somehow also warm, as though he were on the inside of a private joke.

"Did I pass?"

Xigbar laughed. "With flyin' colors. C'mon." He seized Demyx by both wrists and towed him down the hall, toward—Demyx realized—his chambers. Which ordinarily Demyx never protested, but . . . .

"Nnnno. Bath." He dug his heels in until Xigbar stopped. "Bath first. I swear I have a pint of sand in my boots alone. And you're coming too."

Xigbar looked at him, then laughed again—not his gunshot-laugh, but a longer laugh, warmer. "Okay, okay, I guess you deserve it today."

*******

The Castle expanded and grew rooms on its own, and had shaped individual chambers for each of its inhabitants—rooms that suited them well. More than half of the space allocated for Demyx had grown in as baths, dominated by a tub many feet wide and deeper than Demyx was tall. Demyx shed his robe immediately and sat on one of the low white benches. Sand rattled from the folds of his garment and skittered across the floor. He pulled off his boots. More sand.

Xigbar loomed in front of him, and for a moment Demyx remembered why Xigbar had been frightening—was frightening—but only for a moment, because contact was more important than fear, and trust was a thin tenuous thing among the Nobodies but more precious than anything, when you could find it. He slid the zipper down Xigbar's cloak and pushed it off his shoulders, revealing a lot of lean muscle, olive skin marked with long reddish lightningbolt scars. And sand, and dust. Xigbar kicked off his boots, which Demyx approved of, but swathed a towel around his waist, which he definitely didn't. Oh well—that was solveable.

"We're not getting in the bath like this," Demyx said, his hand lingering on Xigbar's flat stomach. "We're filthy."

"Isn't that kinda the _point_ of bathing?" Xigbar sounded bemused.

"If you want to thrash around in muddy water and get grit in your hair, you can do that somewhere besides my bath." Demyx dipped a jug into the warm bathwater, turned his face up, and poured it over himself. Water sluiced over his face and chest, carrying away the clinging dirt and dried sweat and also the unbearable aridness that had crackled through him like a poison. He drew up another jugfull and looked up at Xigbar, who looked back with an eyebrow quirked.

Okay, so maybe no pouring. "Sit," he said, and Xigbar sat, although not without a okay-I'll-humor-you-kid look. Demyx grabbed a sponge and turned sideways, tucking one foot under him and wringing the sponge out so the water dripped over Xigbar. Dust ran away in visible rivulets. "Ugh," he said, soaking the sponge in more water, "you're filthy." Xigbar snorted. Demyx wrung the sponge out again, and then wiped it gently down Xigbar's right arm, over his chest, across his stomach and back up the other side. Xibar sighed, relaxing minutely. Demyx smoothed the sponge over Xigbar's back, and let his fingers linger on Xigbar's wet skin, running over his long back muscles. They didn't have hearts, but they did have bodies, and his was responding to Xigbar's lean, wiry form.

He let his fingers linger on Xigbar's spine, dipping lower. Xigbar's breathing caught, and Demyx hid a smile against his scarred shoulder.

He made quick work of Xigbar's back and legs, and simply emptied the last of the clean water over his sweaty, sandy feet. "I don't think there's any help for your hair, though," he said.

"_My_ hair?" Xigbar demanded. "Look in a mirror." Demyx waved off his protest and slid into the bath.

The water felt good, a tingling full-body caress, and though Demyx knew intellectually that the others didn't experience water in the same way he did, it was hard for him to really accept that fully. He relaxed immediately, feeling as if the touch of the water had completed a vital circuit under his skin, and was only dimly aware of Xigbar coming to sit on the edge of the bath with his feet in the water.

Demyx didn't even try to resist the water's beckoning; he slid down underwater, eyes open to watch the ripple-patterns and distortions of the surface. After a long moment of contemplation, he let out his breath and watched the chain of bubbles drift to the surface.

A hand closed around his upper arm and wrenched him to the surface. Xigbar was bent almost double to glare at Demyx, and in this context the fierce look on his face made Demyx want to laugh. He resisted.

"What're you trying to do, kid," Xigbar demanded, "drown yourself?"

"What?" He scrubbed a hand through his hair, felt it stick up briefly and then fall back under the weight of the water. "No." He licked the water from his own lips. " . . . Axel doesn't light himself on fire, you never fall on your head, and I can't drown."

Xigbar let go of his arm, still frowning a little. The question _Were you worried about me?_ formed itself in Demyx's head, and he tried the taste of it on his lips, but didn't actually ask it. He wasn't sure of the answer, and the pleasure of hearing 'yes' wouldn't make up for the discomfort of hearing 'no.' Instead he said, "You still have your towel on. _And_ your eyepatch."

"The eyepatch stays," Xigbar said, but that implied that the towel didn't, and sure enough, to Demyx's delight, he loosened it.

"That's better," he said, a little breathless. But Xigbar was still on the edge of the bath, just up to his calves in the water, and that wasn't quite right either. On impluse, Demyx lunged, seized Xigbar's hands, and pulled.

Under normal circumstances he'd have had no chance of shifting Xigbar unless he wanted to be shifted, not only because Xigbar was stronger than he was, but also because Xigbar had preternaturally good balance. (Gravity and Xigbar had a special understanding.) But this was two ways Demyx's territory: first by dint of being in his chambers, and second by dint of being in water. So he had the advantage. Xigbar lost his balance with a cry of surprise and made a great splash as he hit the water. This time Demyx didn't try to stop himself from laughing. Xigbar wiped water from his forehead with the back of his hand, and gave Demyx a baleful look. His mouth opened, and Demyx decided he wasn't too interested in whatever Xigbar had to say, and so slid forward and kissed him in one easy motion.

Xigbar made a startled noise that turned into a pleased one. Demyx closed his eyes and hung on, one hand on Xigbar's shoulder and the other in his hair. It was good—it was _good_—warm water on his skin and warm skin agains his and Xigbar's mouth not warm but _hot_. It was pure pleasure after days of physical and metaphysical discomfort, and he didn't even hesitate. He parted his lips and coaxed Xigbar's tongue into his mouth, sucking it gently, moaning; Xigbar was moaning, too, and this was _much_ better than talking.

They did too much talking, all of them did too much talking, too much talking and thinking and almost no touching and no singing whatever, and he was water and water was rhythm and melody and touch. He was aware of being water more firmly now than he had before, as if surrounding himself with his antithesis made him more fully what he was, tempered him, revealing his weaknesses and then scorching them away. He kissed Xigbar, one open-mouthed kiss after another, stroking delicate licks over his tongue; he held tight, one arm around Xigbar's neck and the other sliding down through his wet ponytail to his waist. His fingertips ghosted over the shiny-smoothness of Xigbar's dark scars. Demyx hooked a leg around his thigh without thinking, and then both went under, and then Xigbar flailed and pulled away.

"Might be that you can't drown," he said, "but I can."

"Whoops," Demyx said, but he felt utterly unrepentant. He rippled forward, hands again on Xigbar's forearms, backing the other man up against one of the low ledges along the bath's sides. "Better?" He latched onto Xigbar's neck, tasting clean skin and water. He could feel the rumble of Xigbar's laughter against his chest.

"You're eager."

"S'the water," Demyx said. "It, uh . . . " But there weren't words for it, any more than Xigbar had ever been able to adequately explain why he was so exhilarated and invigorated by the void of space. Instead of trying to explain, he licked the flat shiny surface of Xigbar's scar under his eye, down his cheek to his jaw, skipped down to his collarbone and over his chest, sinking lower into the water.

"No complaints," Xigbar said, winding a hand through Demyx's hair.

"I'd hope not," Demyx murmured against his chest, licking his nipple. Xigbar made a _fascinating_ noise, somewhere between a yelp and a moan, and Demyx did it again to see if Xigbar would make the same noise. He didn't; he growled and caught Demyx by the upper arms, hauling him up so they were chest-to-chest, Xigbar just a little taller, and kissed him again. Xigbar's kisses weren't slow and wet; they were fierce and deep and quick, like a falcon diving.

Demyx snaked a hand around and loosed Xigbar's hair from its tie, so that it fell in heavy wet locks around his face. "Oh," Demyx said. "_Oh_." He slithered back. Xigbar made a protesting sound and reached out for him. "Come here," Demyx said breathlessly. "I promise I won't drown you."

Xigbar cocked an eyebrow. "Not inspiring a lot of confidence—"

"Please?" He tread water, shoulders-deep, holding out a hand. Xigbar rolled his eyes, but that was usually a sign he was on the verge of giving in, and sure enough after a moment he pushed off of the side of the bath and glided toward Demyx. Demyx caught him, laughing, laughing, in his element, and held him by the shoulders, and said, "Trust me. Trust me." And drew Xigbar underwater.

And oh, that was good, the way he looked: long lean body like a shark, silver-streaked hair fanning back, eyes closed because not everyone liked water in their eyes as much as Demyx. Demyx moaned, flooded again with heat, heedless of the fact that they were underwater, because the water wouldn't let anything bad happen to him. Xigbar looked good most of the time, in a sharp and ferocious way, but he never looked better than with his hair loose, and no one ever looked better to Demyx than they did wet.

Demyx pulled Xigbar back to the surface, and they were both gasping but for different reasons. Well. Demyx slid his hand down over Xigbar's chest and belly to his erection, and wrapped his fingers around it—maybe not entirely different reasons. They were both back on the ledge, and he straddled Xigbar's lap and said, "Now. Yes."

Xigbar kissed him, and he kissed back, wet and tangling; he felt fingers pressing at him, opening and preparing him, and thought dimly, _Oh, good, he found the waterproof lube,_ because he hadn't had the presence of mind to let go of Xigbar long enough to direct him to it. It didn't take long; he was so relaxed already, and so longing. He writhed, trying to get some friction, arching his erection against Xigbar's stomach and hooking his feet under Xigbar's calves. Then Xigbar's hands were on his hips, lifting him. Demyx arched his back and cried out open-mouthed, a cry that turned into a moan on the long slide.

He stroked Xigbar, kept stroking him, up his flanks and sides and over his ribs, because wet skin felt so good. Xigbar let go of his hips and Demyx let the rhythm of the water move him, set his pace by the bath's steady lapping.

Xigbar never wasted time. His hand closed on Demyx's erection. Demyx's head fell back and he sighed a long sigh with heat behind it, licking his lips, feeling the slide of skin on skin and the strokes within him and the steady rippling touch of water and oh, oh . . . He wasn't going to last long but, judging from the noises he was making, neither was Xigbar. So it was all right, it was all all right . . . .

He lost it first, and keened as he came, pleasure dragging at him like a tide. He let it catch and hold him and rode it out until the current lay him back on the shore again, and then he kept moving until Xigbar's hands flexed tight on his thighs and he snarled and thrust up hard and came himself.

Demyx sagged against him, breathing hard. He felt Xigbar ghost a kiss on his temple. When he'd caught his breath, he sat up again, playing absently with a lock of Xigbar's hair. "You should wear your hair down more often." He wrapped the strand around his hand. "Like, _ever._"

Xigbar's mouth turned up at one corner. "It wouldn't affect you like it does if I did."

Demyx stuck out his tongue, and Xigbar leaned in with easy speed to trap it between his lips, and they kissed for a very long time, liquid.

"So I passed?" Demyx breathed against Xigbar's scarred cheek.

"Yeah." Xigbar sighed and ran a hand lightly up Demyx's spine. "I figured you would."

"Really?"

"Yes." And it wasn't a lie, Demyx knew. Xigbar wasn't needlessly cruel—which was a big part of why Demyx was there at all—but he wouldn't lie about something he perceived to be so important. "You're stronger than you look. Or act."

Demyx lay his cheek against Xigbar's shoulder again, immensely warmed. It occurred to him to wonder whether it was odd that it delighted him more to be called 'competent' by his lover than it would have to be called 'alluring.' He suspected that Emyd would have felt differently. But it was what it was.

"Strong or not," he said, "I'm exhausted." He stood, swaying a little, water running rivulets over his skin that he didn't bother to brush away. "Are you, uh . . . " Xigbar generally stayed, but not always; and he preferred it immensely when he did, because the World was a cold place.

"Yeah," Xigbar said, and to Demyx's considerable shock, he reached out a hand for Demyx to help him up.

Demyx took it.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted at [Livejournal](http://sister-coyote.livejournal.com/7291.html) and [Dreamwidth](http://sister-coyote.dreamwidth.org/97421.html).


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